Whump!
by pronker
Summary: Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose. (Sequel to No Remedy For Memory and prequel to Sunny Days Sweeping The Clouds Away)


Title: Whump!

Author: pronker

Era: After No Remedy for Memory and before Sunny Days Sweeping The Clouds Away.

Summary: Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.

A/N Thanks to brodiew over on theforceDOTnet for bringing up the topic of Whump!Fic. The prompt was from a list on theforceDOTnet, the canon characters are based on Quirt and Flagg, if that helps any, and the non-canon character is recognizable and not mine.

IOIIOIOIOIO

"We made it! We made it! I can't believe it!"

"Leggo of me!"

"Yaayyyyyyy! We made it! We're saved!"

"Leggo, I said! Was that a kiss? Ew! I'm not your mother!"

_Whump! _Two commando penguins just shy of middle age but in tiptop physical condition landed cock-a-hoop in front of another penguin who was immeasurably older. The older one watched as the two rocketed to their feet and got their bearings. Their smiles and laughter faded as they realized where they were.

St. Peter put his flippers on his hips. "Oh it's you two. I was wondering when you'd get here."

He ticked one Manfredi and one Johnson from his ledger. The taller of the two newcomers swallowed back envy that the sainted bird could read and write. His and Manfredi's lives might have been different if they could read and write. They would probably have lived longer, for one thing. He kept eyes front as St. Peter looked them up and down.

"At ease," the saint said. "Chill out, boys. You're going to be at ease for the rest of time."

Manfredi was the first to speak to an actual saint. "It ain't right in your presence, sir." He nudged Johnson, who had already slumped to let his belly hang out and begun to look around for something to do or to eat, he wasn't fussy which.

Johnson nodded as he assumed a parade rest position. He answered with what seemed to be perfect to spout off to this particular saint. "Dauði er víss líf er ekki!"

It didn't have the effect he had hoped for.

"Well, yes, death is certain and life is not. Is that all you have to tell me?"

Johnson's knees trembled as they never had in combat. He had been up before the captain's mast more times than he could count and this felt no different. They were to be judged? And it was up to him to find reasons for them to pass through the golden scrollwork gates? He glanced sideways at Manfredi, who still stayed at attention. Manfredi, who could talk the lychees away from a lemur, who could talk the beach balls off a zoo souvenir shop shelf, who could -

The saint appeared to take pity on the two, but hey, that was his job, wasn't it? "Start small, son. How did you die?"

Manfredi was the best one to begin, right? So why wasn't he beginning but standing rigid like he was stuck in the blue cave ice of Svínafellsjökull glacier? The storytelling fell to Johnson, who was no good at it and knew it.

"W-We drowned."

St. Peter noted briefly on his ledger. "Continue."

"Um, it hurt a lot?"

This observation produced no scribbling. "Did you expect it not to?"

Manfredi kept stony as Johnson begged his buddy with his whole body to say something. This was not part of their vaunted teamwork at all when they were alive.

"No, sir," managed Johnson.

Here on the Endless Iceberg's metaphorical rim, a breeze half the strength of a typical Antarctic gale of 35 knots per hour performed the function of setting newcomers at ease. Johnson wasn't feeling at ease despite his loose-limbed stance. St. Peter shrugged.

"Judgment is suspended - "

If penguins could sweat, Johnson would have. As it was, he waggled his tail before he got his nervous habit under control. "I, I, did notice that we didn't need to swim the Eternally Foggy Sea to get here. We just popped up at Your Reverence's podium. C-C-Could you explain, sir?"

From Manfredi came a strangled _blrk _that Johnson interpreted as his pal's signal to keep on keeping on.

St. Peter added another notation before twirling his quill into the air as he leaned on one elbow. Johnson supposed it was air, anyway. Just like in battle, he focused all his will on winning this skirmish with a da-er, blas-, er, crummy saint.

St. Peter threw Johnson a look that said he could read minds. Johnson swallowed what felt like the autographed New York Behemoth's game-used football that he had planned on ordering from eBay before - well, before.

"Sir, him and me learnt as hatchlings that Godmother Death chucks penguins into the Eternally Foggy Sea and we need to swim to the Endless Iceberg. So how come me and Manfredi are different?"

A _mtrkglbt_ issued from Manfredi. His rock-steady attentive posture crumbled around the edges.

A frown furrowed a saintly white brow. "You know, I'm not sure. Go on with your story and I'll try to have an answer when you're done."

Manfredi turned to Johnson now, but only to plead with big puppy dog eyes for Johnson to continue his lucky roll of the dice in conversing with an actual saint. Johnson responded with his usual look saying _I'll get you later for this _until he remembered that there was no later.

"It was sorta unusual how we died."

"I'm listening."

Where to start, where to start ... Johnson took a deep breath.

"The Big Boss stuck our Skipper with this lame undercover assignment in Guatemala and Kowalski said that the April weather there oughta be _kanskje_ super but _kanskje nei _so the six of us became seven when we hooked up with Xochi the ballerina spy well Rico is the one who hooked up for reals if you get me - "

Manfredi found his voice. "That's too far back, you goofball. He don't want to hear all this, _mamaluke._"

"Knucklehead. Now you listen to me - "

"Like I did in Punta Arenas? The barrista is probably still mopping up the macchiato syrup - "

"Hold your halibuts, you were the one who had to have a little taste of home - "

The Endless Iceberg shouldn't have had storms, but thunder rumbled somewhere in its vastness. The two penguins snapped to attention again. St. Peter jingled his keys.

"I take it back that you'll be at ease forever. I see now that you'll never be at ease until I separate you." St. Peter pointed with his quill. "You go that way, Manfredi, you go that way, Johnson. Do not waddle within hollering distance or I will know it. Next in line!"

Once his beak got unstuck, Manfredi pursued an agenda that Johnson was loathe to agree with, at least publicly.

"Sir, that would be cruel and I've not ever heard it said that a saint could be cruel."

Now as never before, Manfredi needed backup. So be it. In death as in life, he'd stand together with his - well, whatever Manfredi was to him. Kowalski had called the two of them co-dependent but Johnson called them _synergized _once he learned what the big word meant.

"Sir St. Peter, sir, if I tell you better how we died will you lighten up on us? I mean, I never thought him and me'd be s-separated. It don't feel right."

St. Peter stopped jingling his keys. "Very well. Time has no meaning here and you know, the line behind you will never end until the True End And New Beginning."

"Huh?" was startled out of two beaks. "What?"

There must be something like air here or maybe it was ancient habit that St. Peter started to blow a raspberry before he stopped himself. "Just get on with it. I feel my old impatience coming back to life and I'd rather it didn't."

Manfredi pushed Johnson forward until Johnson edged into St. Peter's podium or bima or lectern or whatever the braap it was. Johnson knew how to handle this familiar sitch because he'd had decades of practice dealing with Manfredi. "Knock it off, you're bending the feathers! I'm building to it! Gosh!"

"Five, four, three, two - "

"Shut up, Manfredi! Sorry, sir, I can't take him anywhere. As I was saying, me and this rævhål landed right around April Fools Day for an undercover mission that was snakebit from the beginning before it went straight to - well, you know. On the way back to Central Park Zoo on April 6th, a honking gigundo out of season typhoon hit our freighter that we six had stowed away on just outside of Retalhuleu - "

"It was not! It was outside Sonsonate - "

"Sir, smack him one. I won't tell nobody."

St. Peter threw an Admiral Bull Halsey's glare towards Manfredi and he subsided. "Sorry, sir. Go on, jerkface."

"I'll consider the source, _Manfredi, _and ignore you. Onward. Our team had smuggled ourselfs into the hold which you'd think would be safe but you'd be wrong. The ship shimmied like a girl I knew once and Manfredi got seasick - "

"Was that Juanita? Wasn't she a hoot and a half? And I did not! Sorry, sorry. Go on. Oh wait, wasn't Juanita the one who ate saltines in b-"

"- Bermuda! And yeah, I picked her up after you dumped her and by all that's holy, the dumb captain, not our Skipper, no never him, I mean the ship's captain, _lightened the ship by jettisoning the cargo."_ St. Peter, Manfredi, and Johnson shook their heads.

"I captained ships many times," offered St. Peter. "You want to hold onto ballast unless you're about to sink."

The three of them nodded in naval camaraderie before Johnson continued. "Yup, but that's what the noob did. I guess he thought the typhoon was the worst storm he'd ever been in because he wasn't like me and my _bror_ here. He wasn't experienced."

Manfredi added, "Pblblbbl. The kid captain panicked, that's all there was to it because the typhoon drove the ship towards shore after the crew plopped our crate into the Pacific with us inside it. Heck, yes, it was stormy but not _that_ stormy."

Johnson turned to Manfredi. "Remember how we thought we'd be picked up? What a laugh on us!"

Burbling wasn't something Manfredi did often in life, but Johnson thought he seemed to have relaxed in death. "Ha, yeah, when the waves broke our crate apart were we fooled or what?"

"And then when we two drifted from the rest of the team, didn't Skipper look funny throwing those pool noodles at us? Like they'd do any good!"

Two penguins heehawed but the third one remained sober. "That must have been traumatic for him to try to save his two soldiers and fail."

Johnson wiped his eyes and peered into the line stretching to fuzzy distances behind him. "Hey, where are the guys and the kid, I mean Skipper? Can we meet up with them because I want to rub Skipper's face in - "

Manfredi supplied an answer in a subdued tone. "I already looked for them, _bicciuridu."_

Two pairs of eyes begged and St. Peter responded after checking his ledger. "They didn't make it."

Manfredi drooped. "They must have went _zutt' u' basciament'."_

"What?" Johnson's voice rose to Command Master Chief Petty Officer level. "They've _gotta_ be here because _none _of them ever did anything _remotely_ bad - "

"I mean they're alive."

Manfredi sniffled, well Skipper had always said he was the cute one, the one with feelings to spew until everyone got sugar diabetes. Johnson only nodded. "Good. Good." St. Peter leaned on his podium, looking ready for a long story.

"So go on, Johnson. I'm interested in how you died, remember?" Johnson took these words in stride once he got his soul back on track. Dayyum, he'd hated to think of losing his favorite team forever.

"Okay. Sir. You remember the pool noodles?"

"Uh huh."

The story actually was pretty entertaining, come to think of it, so it deserved some hoopla. Johnson put on his tell-me-if-you've-heard-this-one face. "The cargo must have been for maybe Hobby Lobby because pool noodles, pink party favors, and piñatas made for a colorful splash in the Pacific, lemme tell you. Right off the bat this goomba and me got high up on a floating pink pony piñata so we thought we had a chance."

Manfredi brightened. "We _did_ have a chance!"

Johnson saw that St. Peter wouldn't appreciate the complete destruction of Manfredi's cheer, so he didn't try to be Little Mr. Truth Teller. "Yeah. We thought that for awhile. Then the water soaked the piñatas around us one by one and they fell apart and sank."

"So did ours." Manfredi appeared to be on an even keel now, and Johnson knew he'd be okay with hearing the rest of the story. It wasn't _exactly_ like reliving it.

"It did, _bror, _it did. We grasped at floating straws that used to decorate and fill the fershlugginer things as they went kablooey, and it was only minutes before we lost our lifeboat pony. Next came our drownproofing training that Skipper drilled us on and that helped for some more minutes."

A sunnier memory shone for Manfredi. "I saved two pieces of candy from our piñata. I had the peppermint drop and you had the butterscotch lolly." Right on, if that hadn't been true it would have been unbelievable.

"Yes, good for you, Manfredi. Those helped when we needed a little more energy to keep swimming, but you know, those were honking high waves even if it weren't the worst storm we ever was in and - "

" - we got tired," continued Manfredi. "I breathed in the first water."

"Don't remind me, palio. I was afraid Godmother Death would separate us because you've lived mighty clean and I haven't." Johnson paused. "Can we take five, sir? I - I - _Et øyeblikk."_

St. Peter cleared his throat. "We can stop here, if you wish."

Firm penguin purpose rekindled in Johnson's eyes. "Oh no. You wanted the whole story, well here it comes, sir. He breathed in water and it hurt him and I had to watch him struggle. I was tired, too, but I dived underneath him to buoy him up. He panicked and stood on top of me to get air and then whatever it is you holy joes put inside us to make us want to go on living snookered me and I had to swim to the surface. There was a lightning flash and we saw each other for the last time before he sank. He got littler and littler under the water and the storm smashed him down until he vanished like a _draugen_. I was too bushed to paddle anymore so I floated around for five or six minutes and let me tell you they were long-ass minutes before I deliberately breathed in water. Then I sank. The End."

St. Peter appeared unperturbed. "Thank you for the story. It's been a very long time since I've been alive and I do not miss it. I believe that we have the reason now as to why you two weren't required to swim the Eternally Foggy Sea to reach here."

Johnson supposed the discreet cough from some penguin in the line behind them was based on impatience and not allergies or a headcold or something. Too bad. This was worth disrupting protocol for. He had his beak open to say something on a subject he always struggled with, but good old Manfredi beat him to it.

"The service gave us as much freedom as we could handle and we got to travel the world together." Manfredi moved to stand back to back with Johnson. "If you separate us now, you'll have a fight. Sir."

Johnson was glad Manfredi said the mushy stuff. "Five by five, Manfredi."

"Five by five, Johnson."

The line would never end until one day it would. St. Peter pointed his quill at first Johnson and then Manfredi before closing his ledger. "Break time. You're free to pass through the gates and I'll show you around. Gentlemen, please waddle ahead of me."

When their backs were turned, St. Peter saluted them before smiling broadly at the next penguin in line. "I won't be too long," he said. "Here, take my iPad and find something on Netflix."

IOIOIOIOIO

The End.

IOIOIOIOIO


End file.
